A Note on the Priority of Rumphius' Observation of Decapod Crustacea Living In Nepenthes

Abstract

1987, two zoologists announced that they observed a sesarmine living in the pitcher plant (Nepenthes sp.) and stated that their observation represent[ed] the first record of a nepenthiphilous crab anywhere in the world (Ng & Lim, 1987). If they had said the first record of a decapod crustacean, they would have been wrong by nearly three centuries. It also was not a crab, but a that was first reported living in Nepenthes pitchers, which is an even more intriguing item. The first recorded observation of such a shrimp living in a pitcher plant was a matter-of-fact statement by the great naturalist, Georgius Everhardus Rumphius (1627-1702) in his monumental work Het Amboinsch Kruidboek (The Am bonese Herbal). The laconic registration reads (in my translation): All kinds of little worms and other vermin crawl into the open [pitcher], and will die in there, except one sometimes finds a very small Shrimp that lives there. This reads in Rumphius' original, inimical Dutch prose: In 't geopende kruypen verscheiden wormpjes en ongedierten, die dan daar in sterven, behal ven een zeker kleen Garneeltje, 't welk men zomtyds daar in vind, en woont (Rumphius, 1750, 5: 122). The parallel Latin translation by Joan Burman (in the same volume) has: In aperto varii repunt vermiculi & insecta, quae in hoc moriuntur, excepta parva quadam squilla gibba, quae aliquando in hoc reperitur & vivit. The two passages were printed in Chapter 61 of Book 7 in Volume 5 of the Herbarium Amboinense (p. 122). The was published in seven volumes between 1741 and 1755; volume 5 saw the light of day in 1750. The reason I said that this observation dates from nearly three centuries ago is the following. Rumphius' Herbal was printed posthumously. Its author died in 1702. Rumphius arrived in the East Indies (Indonesia) in the summer of 1653 and was dispatched as a member of a military force to the eastern region of the Indonesian archipelago in November of that year. For the rest of his life,